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Andrea Talmelli

Composer

Italia

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About

(b. 7 July 1950, Modena).Italian composer of mostly orchestral, chamber, choral, vocal, and piano works that have been performed in Asia, Europe and North America.Mr. Talmelli studied composition with Azio Corghi and piano with Lino Rastelli the Conservatorio Arrigo Boito in Parma, where he graduated with a degree in piano in 1972 and a degree in composition in 1977. He also earned a degree in jurisprudence at the Università degli Studi di Parma in 1976 and studied conducting with Piero Guarino from 1977–79.Among his honours are prizes in the competition of the Filarmonica Umbra of Terni (1978, 1988), the competition Guido d'Arezzo in Arezzo (1981), the Premio Muccetti in Parma (1981), and the competition Venezia Opera Prima of the Teatro La Fenice in Venice (1981). His music has been performed in Argentina, Austria, Canada, Croatia, France, Germany, Hungary, India, Italy, Japan, Lebanon, Malta, Mexico, the Netherlands, Norway, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Switzerland, Turkey, the UK, and the USA.He is also active in other positions. He has served as director of the Istituto Musicale Tonelli in Carpi since 1986 and as director of the Istituto Musicale Achille Peri in Reggio Emilia since 1990.He taught composition at the Conservatorio Arrigo Boito from 1975–84 and has taught at its joint high school–conservatory since 1982. He has lectured in Canada, Italy and the USA.His primary publishers are Agenda Editrice, Edizioni Edi.Pan, Edizioni Suvini Zerboni, and Rugginenti Editore.

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What does music mean to you personally?

A natural need that I always felt when I met music and decided to live with her. The joy of listening, playing, writing and communicating with music has led to the weakening of so many other important interests in my life.

Do you agree that music is all about fantasy?

Without serious study, consistency and research continue, the imagination, even when it is recognized, may not be enough or will end very soon. Of course, fantasy is a preliminary and indispensable condition for expressing this creative talent that is part of being an artist.

If you were not a professional musician, what would you have been?

Hard to say why the choices I could have made were many but I did not do it for the need that I had to live this adventure with music. I graduated in law and was offered a job as a bank manager. I refused. But I can not say how much this is due to the fact that we sneak into our lives by often deciding for ourselves or with ourselves.

The classical music audience is getting old, are you worried about your future?

I do not worry about the future if we think there will always be people, young and old, who will love music and classics in particular. I notice it when I give "listening" lessons to people of all ages and all walks of life who follow me with indisputable pleasure and interest. I'm worried, though, because I know we live in a society that does everything to make learning more complex and cultured music more difficult. This affects the ability of people to grow and improve.

What do you envision the role of classical music to be in the 21 century? Do you see that there is a transformation of this role?

Things could get worse because it is the society itself that takes directions that I do not always like: technological progress is important, but it produces too strong acceleration that often confuses values and the connections, and which represent a challenge for the psychophysical possibilities of people to control them. Power is concentrated more and more in the hands of the few, and they have no heart to emancipate people from old and new conditions, which can also be misery and cultural and moral poverty. I would not like to be pessimistic and generally am not. But I wonder what music could do if world was really going in this direction.

When I say that classical music is searching for new ways, what would come to your mind?

Musical art is always and always its time, so we must understand its reasons, even when it manifests itself in forms that we try to understand and accept. And it will be time to say for yourself what's left of this incessant creative becoming beyond fashion and business.

Do you think that the classical musician today needs to be more creative? Whats the role of creativity in the musical process for you?

The role of creativity is central and decisive. It has always been. Not only in art. It is in all the human sciences, in research and even in social and political life. Unfortunately, we often forget our two cerebral hemispheres, one of which concerns only creative intuition. This is not only complementary to the cognitive-linear one. I think that writing music as well as listening involves balancing the two aspects of our mental process.

Do you think we musicians can do something to attract young generation into the classical music concerts? How will you proceed?

Each of us can do our part, according to our own abilities. The school, the composers, the performers, the producers who now have more responsibilities because of the many resources of technological innovations, including the Internet. But I was also going to extend the field to public and private administrators, advertising and sponsorship of classical music not only by benefactors but also by cultural investors.

Tell us about your creative process. How did you start working on your favourite composition?

Certainly my sacred song "If it's a man" written in youth on the emotional wave of reading Primo Levi's book that I had the pleasure of personally experiencing and discussing with him the fundamental theme of "memory" . I started working after meeting important works on this subject by authors such as Penderecki, Nono, Petrassi and Shostakovich.

We, Moving Classics TV, love the combination of classical music with different disciplines: music and painting, music and cinematography, music and digital art, music and poetry. What do you think about these combinations?

This is one of the most interesting novelties of our time, the fusion of different artistic expressions. This often requires synergy between different artists who can collaborate together by changing the traditional way of understanding the artist. Thanks to technology advancing at impressive rates, we now have a wealth of experience in this regard. But beware, because it's getting harder and harder to distinguish something that's really original and creative today beyond the fascination of wonders than the many things you can do with technology, but can also become commonplace too early.

Can you give advice to young people who want to discover classical music for themselves?

Only a few of them can do it on their own, if they already have a solid training. I recommend experiencing the excitement of going to live concerts that are always very useful if you want to listen to the most established repertoire from the history of music. But I think it should be a serious school, which is not put at the service of commercial fashion, which could "educate"young people to listen to classical music. When that happens, the results are incredibly numerous, but that's why they also need competent teachers.

Now it is a common practice in the media to talk that the classical music is getting into the consumption business, do you agree? We are speaking about the supply and demand rules and how to sell your “product” in your case your compositions. How do you see it?

It is right that there is also demand and supply in art. After all, there has always been this rule. The thing, however, is very complicated because today's rules are too focused on 'consuming' by the need to reach as many buyers as possible; a commercial law that too often reduces the quality of art. It is right, therefore, to protect, even with the appropriate financial support, the serious work of many artists who work independently of these requirements. It would be really bad to lose this freedom and this creative effort, a condition sine qua non for the quality of art and the evolution of languages.

Do you have expectations what regards your listeners, your audience?

Of course. Recover as much as possible an essential relationship of communication through music without losing honesty to myself and what I want to express again.

What projects are coming up? Do you experiment in your projects?

I always like to have an excuse to write offered by other artistic expressions: the combination with poetry certainly, but also with painting. Recently, I made a compositional triptych on Composition VIII of Kandinskj. But I also like to experiment with creativity using new tools such as those offered by computer music. Although somewhat scary for the infinite universe of possibilities it presents.

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MOVING CLASSICS TV is a popular curated discovery channel for new piano music. It gives visitors a valuable inside view of new piano music with contemporary emotions. The channel has been founded by a team of music lovers from Munich in 2017.

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